Every single person needs therapy. Yet week after week, my clinic's waiting room is exclusively filled with women. Logically, you would assume women are the main demographic in need, but what if I told you the group that would benefit most is missing from the room?
My mom found the clinic on a Facebook group in January of junior year. From then on, every Thursday I found myself sitting in the waiting room, AirPods in and head down. It took me months of locking myself in my room studying, sobbing about stress and friends, and not talking to my family for me to reach out and ask for help.
In 11th grade, I cried 109 times over 293 days (yes, I counted). That’s one cry every 2.688 days. After crying 45 times in the first semester (the least stressful of the two) and talking to friends who go to therapy, I realized I couldn't handle my emotions on my own—I needed help.
Even with my attempts to be inconspicuous in the exposed waiting room, I made eye contact with countless girls from school. With each passing week, my AirPods went from noise-canceling to transparency mode and I started looking up. I would smile at the mother with her young daughter to my right, acknowledge the two teenage girls to my left, and nod to the woman behind me in her mid-twenties. Everyone seeking help around me was a woman.
Seeing a boy cry at school is an anomaly—I don’t know if I could tell you the last time I saw it happen—but it’s an off week if I don’t see a girl going into the bathroom with her friends, tears welling in her eyes, and coming back five minutes later, laughing. Similarly, I’ve never seen a boy over the age of seven or so at my clinic, nor heard a boy talk about therapy, ever.
The lack of discussion around EQ leaves me in a waiting room full of women.
Boys tend to have lower levels of emotional intelligence (EQ) than girls. Critical aspects of EQ include the ability to recognize one’s own emotions, learn from them, and empathize with others. It’s not that boys don’t feel emotions on the same level as girls, but the approach they take to deal with them is different. Boys are conditioned societally to view emotions as problems—something to be solved—rather than as insight into who they are.
When we don't know how to process our own emotions, it makes it challenging to be there to support others. Believe it or not, if I’m complaining about something, the last thing I need is a solution. I want an, “Oh wow, Norah, that really sucks,” or an, “I’m here if you want to talk anything through,” not an, “If you’re stressed why don’t you just put aside more time at home to do homework?” I want to be heard and empathized with, not invalidated.
When people respond like this, my likelihood of confiding in them again is diminished—it’s more difficult to build deep, trusting relationships when I can’t open up. I’m able to go to the bathroom with my friends and break down crying because I know they’ll be understanding. From what I hear, boys would never let themselves cry at school, especially not in front of their friends. Boys have told me this is because they don’t know who to talk to or how to verbalize their feelings.
Clearly, the ability to empathize with others, recognize your own emotions, and learn from them is hindered by this problem-solving mentality. This mentality is a product of societal taboos that prevent boys from effectively communicating their emotions.
Having high EQ can promote better health, happiness, and lower stress levels, while a low EQ damages relationships with others and long-term mental health. So why is boys' lower EQ not a hot topic of discussion? Instead of news or seminars emphasizing the importance of EQ and the ability of therapy to improve EQ (surprise!), we’re met with wellness advice about phones in school. Boys are already less likely than girls to seek help for psychological issues; therefore, the lack of discussion around EQ leaves me in a waiting room full of women.
I’m a firm believer that every single person can benefit from therapy—the fact that therapy patients are primarily female highlights a huge problem. Therapy helps explore your emotional responses, emotional triggers, and practical strategies to deal with those emotions. Since January, therapy has made me more understanding towards myself. I’m now able to feel an emotion and give it space to be without trying to get rid of it. This directly translates to my friendships, which have gotten so much stronger. So, boys, improve your mental health and relationships with others. Go to therapy.
